Do you struggle with overcoming the risks of starting a legal nurse consulting business? In my last blog, I wrote about what motivated you to start a legal nurse consulting business. Was it the desire for independence, wealth, recognition and fame, or making a contribution?
Do You Embrace or Avoid Risks?
Do you consider the risks of being a business owner? Do they invigorate you or paralyze you? Some people love risk. Others are risk averse. I am reminded of an article I read many years ago written by a nurse who decided her way of managing her stress was to go sky diving. The title of the article was perfect: “Never jump out of a perfectly good airplane”, a phrase used in “Point Blank”. She found she got a rash every time she contemplated going sky diving. I know I’d never get a rash because I’d never jump out of a perfectly good airplane. I’ve worked on a few cases involving parachute accidents with bad endings.
Planning for overcoming the risks
How did you plan for risks? Many legal nurse consultants advise a conservative approach to starting a legal nurse consulting business, “Don’t quit your day job.” Continue your full time job while you start your legal nurse consulting business, and then ease out of your full time job. Or take a part time job and use the remaining days of the week to market. One of the nurses I am mentoring is doing just that.
What are you willing to risk? Depending on how you start your company, you may need to invest large amounts of money on education, mentoring, marketing, and setting up your business. Do you have enough savings to last if you cut yourself off from income and jumped right into getting clients?
The best laid plans…
If you are married, how supportive is your spouse? How secure is his or her job? When I was partway through my masters degree, my husband lost his job. The money we had been about to spend to buy land supported us for a year while I finished my education. For an entire year we did not use a deposit slip. There was no income. When I graduated from my masters degree program, we had $120 in the bank. Luckily I had a job lined up which I began a few days later. A year later, my husband started his own business, which failed after 5 years, and we narrowly avoided having to declare bankruptcy. I know a thing or two about overcoming the risks.
How far are you willing to go to establish your business? How much time will you spend; how much discomfort will you endure? The process of learning something new is always accompanied by discomfort. The process of overcoming the risks can be exhilarating – or uncomfortable.
Benjamin Franklin said, “Most men die at 21. We just don’t bury them until age 60 or 70.” Are you willing to take risks to have a better life, or will you be like my husband’s friend, who has been saying for the last 25 years, “Someday I will start my business.” Now he is retired from his job. He will never start a business.
Nothing will remove all risk from your life. There is risk in being an employee and being laid off. There is risk in crossing the street. Entrepreneurs love the headiness of being in charge of their business, and of taking calculated risks. Is your fear of risk holding you back? Are you actively overcoming the risks?
Pat Iyer MSN RN LNCC is president of The Pat Iyer Group, which she started in 1987. She started Med League, an independent LNC business, in 1989. She mentors nurses who want to get more clients, make more money and avoid expensive mistakes. Contact her for details.